


Tyrant

by xXxKxXx



Category: Loki: Agent of Asgard, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Avenger Loki (Marvel), F/M, Loki (Marvel) Feels
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-18
Updated: 2020-09-08
Packaged: 2021-03-06 09:15:37
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,546
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25967233
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/xXxKxXx/pseuds/xXxKxXx
Summary: With our world in dust and ruins at his feet, they say the Tyrant is more terrifying than he's ever been—unrecognizable, even to those who knew him before the end. The last thing anyone wants is to be brought to his city as a prisoner, but that's exactly what happens to me—a rebel leader. But in the ruins of New York, all things are not as they appear. Post-Avengers, Loki/OC
Relationships: Loki (Marvel) & Original Female Character(s), Loki (Marvel)/Original Character(s), Loki (Marvel)/Original Female Character(s)
Comments: 2
Kudos: 24





	1. Strange Things Happened Here

**Author's Note:**

> Quick Intro:
> 
> Hi, reader!
> 
> If you've come here from God and the Siren, you may notice a familiar name. That's because at the time I wrote GaTS, I had also planned this fic and then ended up putting it on the back burner. You also might recognize the song lyric in this first chapter (you'll know what I mean when you get to it). I was listening to it and the score of Hunger Games: Catching Fire while writing--which is totally the official score of this story in my head. That's what I'll be listening to while writing, if you want to listen to it while reading (does anyone else do this?).
> 
> If you're a returning reader (I love you) and you want to think of this as an "alternate universe" to GaTS where Loki "won the war," you totally can. 
> 
> Fair warning, I'm practicing writing villains, so I'll really be delving into the darker side of Loki's personality/motives in this one (he is evil, after all), so...yeah. Not the same Loki in GatS.
> 
> Happy reading, loves.

_Thump._

Something dropped on the bottom level of the decaying house, loud enough to shock both me and Tiny out of sleep. Grey daylight streamed in through the cracked windows above the dusty bed, tunneling through the holes that slashed across the curtains.

Dust floated through the air around me, swirling as Tiny wriggled out of the lingering hug I had him in. But he stayed silent—an accomplishment, courtesy of his extensive training—while I silenced my breathing and reached for my gun. Eyes wide and fully alert, the cold metal touched my fingertips as I listened for movement.

Nothing…

For a moment, I merely stared out into the silence that fogged the hallway, stoking the dread that clawed its way up my throat.

I inched off the bed with painstaking slowness, wincing as the old frame creaked with the movement. Touching down onto the ground, I turned and gestured to Tiny to “stay.” Lifting the gun in front of me, I placed one foot in front of the other, stepping soundlessly out of the room and down the dusty hallway.

My own breath slipped in and out of my mouth in a fragile thread, hard and steady as I took one step down the stairs, then two. Then three.

_Thump._

I froze, hearing it again—though something in me eased at the realization that it couldn’t have been a Chitauri soldier.

For all that they were tall, merciless brutes—they weren’t sloppy. 

They knew how to hunt.

_Thump thump. Crackle._

I furrowed a brow—what the hell just _crackled_ in this house?

Allowing myself a bit more room to breath, I moved with ease down the rest of the stairs, relief loosening inside me as movement flicked in the corner of my vision, and both my eyes fell on a piece of fireplace plopping into the fire pit. A few more followed.

My shoulders sank as I dropped the gun down to my side, stomach grumbling loudly in time with the relief. I glowered down at my abdomen—honestly, if ever I were killed on a mission, it’d be because my stomach decided to mimic a whale mating call at precisely the wrong moment.

Still, I counted my blessings. Since my rebel camp was raided and destroyed, I’d been traveling from city to city, trying to escape the Tyrant’s bloodthirsty forces that hunted me. I’d hoped for at least a week’s worth of peace before facing off with another Chitauri battalion—or five—on my own.

A lone rebel leader was, after all, the most dangerous thing to be in today’s world.

Cocking my head back, I whistled toward the stairs, hearing Tiny’s heavy footfall scratching down the wooden hallway. Seconds later, he was beside me again. Still staring up at the upstairs floor, part of me considered going back and getting some more sleep—but I had to keep moving. After that adrenaline rush, it would’ve taken far too long to drift back into sleep anyway.

Rule #1 of the Apocalypse: To move is to live.

 _Once you start running, Cerys, don’t look back,_ my predecessor, Marcus, said the day I agreed to be his second-in-command. _They’ll never stop looking for you._

I never thought Marcus’s warning would materialize so soon. The Tyrant had meant to rule us, or so they said, but then the world went to hell within several years of his reign.

The Avengers fell, and there was nothing left to rule.

Even the last encampment I traveled to had been fully raided. Bodies—so many bodies everywhere. We weren’t living things to them—we were just _things._

—assuming it was the Chitauri that were responsible for that tragedy, and not other humans.

Clouds rolled over the sky as I stalked down the walkway of the house, the weather blocking most of the dawn and casting the decrepit suburb into a dismal light. It was much later in the day than I would’ve wanted, but I forced a confident bounce into my step as I headed away from the house, ignoring the silence that covered the town like a physical weight.

The silence of the apocalypse—that was the worst part. Like the welcoming horn of cities’ decay, signs of life now peppered the street on either side of me, cars and toys and basketball hoops all worn down by the passing of time.

My breaths grew shallow as I looked at each and every one of them—noting the sheer volume of them that was in this town. There must have been a lot of happy families living here. A sad, lamenting tune rose in my throat as I beheld it all.

 _“Strange things did happen here, no stranger would it be,”_ I sang along, forcing down the waves of sadness that rose, _“if we met at midnight, in the hanging tree.”_

Tiny whined as he slowed, sticking his head up for me to pet him. Tears stung my eyes, but I forced them down, biting back the memory of my people humming the tune in solidarity.

Deep down, their voices would never go out. They kept me going, as did Tiny—the last vestige of my sanity.

Heart slightly heavier than usual, I followed the empty road along a sea of grass fields—hours and hours of wind blowing against my backside, letting it push me to the edges of the neighboring town. My feet finally began to ache at the first signs of nightfall, the local university appearing in the near distance.

Snow-capped mountains jutted beyond the tops of the buildings, captioning the autumn season. Their peaks disappeared into the clouds, which were starting to look a bit heavy.

“Rain,” I murmured to no one in particular, though Tiny did perk up at the sound of my voice. The collection of grey buildings sat in place like haunting monuments of the past, situated far down the road from where I was, but were they worth exploring—?

 _Vending machines,_ my inner voice realized. _There’ll be vending machines at a university._

My stomach growled approvingly in response. The power bar this morning clearly wasn’t enough to satiate it, and finding one or two vending machines was worth the shot. When the Chitauri first invaded Earth, droves of students had fled home to their families—no one would’ve stuck around to empty the vending machines. With any luck, no one will have thought to do it later on.

It took the better part of an hour to actually reach the campus, the first streaks of rain streaming down the stone buildings around me. I fished out the flashlight from the junk that rummaged about in my bag, but didn’t feel safe enough to turn it on just yet, so I held it at the ready—no need to announce my arrival to anyone.

The darker it grew, the more the buildings seemed to loom like menacing shadows. Papers were strewn here and there, fluttering in the wind that cooled the beads of sweat along my forehead.

I stopped, prompting Tiny to trot back to me from a trash can he’d chosen to explore.

This place was pretty desolate—and no vending machines in sight. Even as I went from building to building, the chances seemed bleak until I found what seemed to be the main one, a grand staircase leading up through multiple levels of a library. One look at the extending stairs and—

 _“Hell no,”_ I murmured to myself. I wasn’t trekking up there.

I shook my head as I walked by it. There was a cafe on the first level of the building that had also caught my attention, thoughupon closer examination, the cracked glass and open refrigerator doors were pretty telling. Someone out here was as ‘smart’ as I was, which meant that any remaining vending machines had likely been raided after all.

“Tiny,” I said, calling him back from behind the counter as I plopped my bag down on a table. “There’s nothing here, kiddo.”

His happy whine was soothing as I glanced around the looming shadows, halfheartedly rummaging through my bag, producing another power bar and half-drunk bottle of water. Setting the bag down on the ground, I lamented the bed that would be replaced by the cold floor tonight.

In another life, I might’ve sat here as a college student, simply having lunch before running off to my next class in the middle of the day. As much as I claimed not to believe in fate, I sometimes wondered if the universe made exceptions here and there.

One thought led to another as I drifted off into the fantasies of what could have been, until Tiny—who had settled beside me—suddenly perked up, ears high and listening. Whatever caught his attention was something that I hadn’t yet perceived.

I glanced down at him with a furrowed brow, then threw my gaze up to the harrowing darkness that had jolted his instincts. “What is it?” I whispered, staring hard in the same direction.

A shadow moved across the empty space, my muscles tensing as I saw it duck behind one of the bookshelves far from where we were sitting.

 _Shit…_

Reaching for my satchel immediately, I grabbed the gun. Making a show of swinging it through the air, I hauled the bag strap onto my shoulder, clicking my tongue quietly for Tiny to follow.

Rule #2 of the Apocalypse: Smart prey doesn’t go looking for the predator.

Moving as quietly as we could in the opposite direction, Tiny and I slipped out through a back door, down a glass hallway, and back into the brisk night.

The air was getting colder, clouding like the mists of vapor I once saw pouring off a glacier. Still, I breathed more easily as soon as we were back on the main road—though the feeling of being watched never left me. Muscles tense, I fought the feeling of it death gripping the back of my neck, looking over my shoulder every now and again for signs of movement.

Stars glinted overhead, keeping us company as the clouds condensed and dispersed in thick rhythms, allowing moonlight to occasionally column down to the road in patches. All seemed peaceful and quiet and true to the lifeless dark of the apocalypse.

Until the glow of the town offset the night sky.

I paused in the middle of the road, brows slowly pinching at the faint ambiance silhouetting the buildings. A dome of yellow lamplight rose with the mist in a sea of blackness, its furthest reaches barely stretching far enough to cast shadows over us.

Light—someone had turned on the lights.

A pang of hope rang through me. I hadn’t seen people since my camp was raided, and for a moment, I allowed myself to stand and stare—letting myself hope.

Finally throwing a glance back in the direction I came from, I continued onward at a faster pace, Tiny trotting quietly beside me.

It took all of thirty minutes to actually reach the edge of the town, and thirty more to carefully weave through the crumbling buildings on the outskirts of it. The series of random lots covered with patches of dead grass and warehouses began to condense, growing more sophisticated as we entered a more metropolitan landscape—captioning our arrival in what looked to be a small downtown area.

I stared at the nearest corner, around which light streamed onto the ground. Shadows moved back and forth along the ground in brisk movements, my heart pounding as I watched them go.

_People, or Chitauri?_

Inching over to the edge, my breath hitched in my throat the moment I saw them. The moment my question was answered.

Battalion upon battalion of chitauri warriors swarmed the dusty street and buildings like insects in an open area. Some were fighting, others crying out in their disgusting language, and all of them scanning their surroundings, exchanging weapons and pointing in every direction.

Screams broke out from sourceless shadows, shattering against the building walls. More yelps through a number of windows. My lungs stalled, eyes flickering up to the streetlights that continued to glow—people had to have been inhabiting this town, generating this electricity for themselves.

 _Mistake,_ I thought to myself as I looked up at the street lamps. _Those were a mistake._

The Chitauri had no use for electricity in such areas, and…I should’ve known. I should’ve known better, for my part.

 _“Tiny,”_ I hissed, inching back from the corner of the building.

He needed no other command. Paw by paw, he moved backward with me, our footsteps barely resonating in the darkness until—

Tiny suddenly yelped as a net was thrown over him. My eyes snapped to him, wide and alert, then to the tall, muscular assailant that had him in a choke hold, his muscles moving like sinewy chords beneath translucent skin. The soldier was fast as he grabbed Tiny off the ground—like he was nothing—but I was faster.

Or so I thought.

My gun had just begun swinging upward toward the soldier, when my brief hesitation suddenly cashed in its cost—and someone else clocked me in the back of the head.

I fell to the ground, clouds of dirt kicking into my mouth. My hands swirled underneath me, my vision blurry as they tried to hoist me up. A boot clamped down on my back, shoving me back into the earth.

“ _Aj kalj ieksin mar,”_ a voice began. “ _Jur laksim navre’te?”_

A second voice answered in the same language, and rage cut through me at the chitauri warrior that had his clutches on Tiny’s net, muzzling him as the other held me down.

_They couldn’t have him. Not him._

The second my vision touched a state of normalcy, I threw all my strength into turning over and disarming the soldier that held me down. In a serious of sharp movements, I was back on my feet—albeit a bit unsteadily—and flesh thumped against armor as I fought hard as hard as I could.

And there was about a second’s worth of warning—a quick movement in the shadows out of the corner of my eye—before a flash of light blinded me, and I startled backward as a streak of electrical current shot out from the darkness.

It cut through my abdomen, sending pain through my body, and forced me to my knees. My body was already so weak, so frail—it crumbled easily to the ground, and I barely managed to look up at the dark figure emerging from the shadows.

Clad in black armor and a mask that covered his face, my heart raced as he sauntered toward us slowly, looking between myself, the Chitauri, and Tiny. I breathed out something unintelligible, but my body refused to move. Partly from pain, but mostly from fear—fear of what I realized was one of the Tyrant’s bounty hunters.

Step by step, he came to a stop nearby me. Silent for a moment, the hunter scanned the scene—the two soldiers cowering in his presence, flinching as his cruel voice suddenly rose to speak in their language.

I squirmed in place, fear bleeding into my limbs at the thought of what they were discussing.

Leaders who were assigned bounty hunters were never killed on sight. They were taken away, presumably to the city, where the Tyrant resided. It was the lone place on Earth that was rumored to be alive, still—though everything about it was as much a mystery as the Tyrant himself.

For all that he was terrifying before, they said that his gaze—should he deign to throw it your way—was ‘death’ enough to stop your heart.

 _Fuck that,_ my inner voice protested weakly, but my limbs barely showed the same gumption, hardly moving a millimeter in any of the directions I commanded them to.

The chitauri didn’t seem to notice, speaking to the bounty hunter as he pointed at me, then at Tiny. Panic began to settle as my vision went in and out of focus.

 _No…_ I gritted my teeth, tears filling my eyes, my limbs trembling with fear. _Move, Cerys! Move!_

Rule #3 of the Apocalypse: Be brave _._

My arm moved like a weight along the ground as I dragged it out, reaching for the gun that had slid away from me by a few feet—but a boot clamped down on my wrist, wrenching a cry as it was forced into the broken cement.

Still, I bore my teeth in defiance and reached for the gun anyway.

A low, menacing chuckle from the bounty hunter, and then he spoke—in English, _“She is already broken.”_

Another zap of electricity, and my vision went dark.


	2. The Tyrant's City

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry about the name change, for those who saw it before! I listened to "Individual Assessment" from Catching Fire as I wrote this, in case anyone's weird like me and likes to listen to scores while reading.

Wheels bumped and crackled along the ground underneath me, shaking me out of some unknown amount of sleep.

My eyes opened to an onyx sky, stars swathing across the blackness like diamond dust. My face felt heavy, my limbs even more so. If not for the hard surface underneath me, I might’ve thought for a moment that I was camping somewhere safe—the very notion promptly dispelled as soon as I tried to move.

Pain jolted through my abdomen as I tried to sit up, my hands tied together at the wrists. It took a moment to realize that my ankles had also been tied, and the rest of me was too weak to pry out of my bindings.

 _Fuck_ —that weakness was what got me into this.

Releasing a strangled groan, I rolled over and forced myself onto my elbows, dragging my body to the side of the metal encasing.

I was in the back of a truck.

A dark, slumbering form turned over in the shadows, drawing a sharp gasp from my lungs. Tiny rolled over in his sleep, seeming unharmed—likely dosed up with something.

Hell, maybe I’d been dosed up too. That would explain the slurred grogginess that had me swaying back and forth.

I dragged my eyes upward, taking a closer look at my desolate surroundings.

Shining through broken glass windows and crumbled walls—comprising the dark, monstrous shadows that jutted to the skies around me—were lamps, flickering and glitzing along platforms that rose with what was left of the city’s skyscrapers. Dark, silhouetted forms walked back and forth in front of them, roaming over the various levels. They were vaguely human, or so it seemed, though some of them moved a little too fast to be.

I startled at the sound of yelping nearby, my eyes darting around the shadows until I placed the source. Two nearby shadows moved between the buildings, pausing as we drove by.

_Chitauri._

Two more sentinels sauntered up the broken sidewalk, turning to look as we passed by—and that was all the confirmation that I needed.

The Tyrant—Loki. This was his city.

I was in old New York.

The pale hue of lamplight fell on my face as all my features sank in horror, my heart weighing heavily with fear as the truck carried us onward, the skyscrapers getting longer and taller the further we moved along the urban landscape.

Panic started to overtake me, my heart palpitating with fear as the spinning lights became a blur, the sound of chattering and—laughter?—in the far distance lowering to a dull roar. Suddenly, I didn’t feel the movements of the truck anymore. Pressing my eyes shut, I fell back onto my side—praying that when I opened them again, this would all be a nightmare. I never saw this place, I was never here—I was never taken.

The movements stopped for real eventually, and I opened my eyes back up reluctantly. Daring to look over the edge of the truck, I saw that we’d halted before a vast set of iron gates, spanning in both directions to the left and right.

All the muscles in my throat clenched as I turned my attention beyond the shadowy threshold—up at the glittering, mountainous palace erected from three or four skyscrapers that had fallen against one another, silhouetted by the moonlight that managed to stream through the cloudy sky.

One of the rumors I’d heard about this place was instantly discredited—this city was as much a ruin as the rest of the world. And, in as much as civilization fell fast and hard at the hands of the Chitauri, the couple of years that passed clearly weren’t enough time to build a palace worthy of a king.

That’s not to say that this makeshift one wasn’t impressive…On the contrary, I found it rather terrifying. And its brutal architecture—if that’s what you would call it—perhaps made it doubly more fitting than a palace of alabaster stone and colorful banners.

The impulse to scramble out of the truck wracked my limbs as two sentinels came around back to stare at me, my skin crawling at the feeling of their lidless eyes on me.

I wouldn’t have made it far anyway, and…Tiny—I couldn’t leave him.

Animals were usually left alone—never shot or maimed on the field—and were suspected to be taken to the city when they were healthy enough to be trained. Sometimes, they returned with the Chitauri battalions as tracker animals.

Tiny didn’t flinch as the back of the truck was flung open, and a soldier grabbed me by the ankle. Trying to scramble away, my arms and legs moved groggily, and I smacked face-first onto the ground instead. Hands grabbed at me from every angle, thrusting me between them as someone else muttered in the guttural language of the Chitauri.

A chill ran down my spine—I recognized that voice. The voice of the bounty hunter who’d caught me. I let out a weak groan as I was passed to him, but my listless protest was nothing against the strong arms that shoved me onward, pushing me closer and closer to the iron gates of the ‘palace’—if that’s what they called it.

 _“N-No,”_ I moaned as I was pushed through the creaking gates, opening to let us pass. _“Please, don’t…”_

It was pointless, but no one could say I didn’t fight it. Scrambling every step of the way, dirt kicked up with every shuffle of my boots against the ground. The truck engine turned on somewhere behind me, my heart squeezing as it roared to life and then tapered away in the opposite direction.

The door to the palace wasn’t even a proper ‘door’—it’d been fashioned as a set of sheer curtains, taken from the lobby of whatever this building once was, leading to a crumbling chamber of what was once a glittering entryway—a hotel, maybe?

A single ruined carpet led the way in, lamps situated on the walls in an orderly fashion along the jagged, broken walls, letting in sparse bits of the city’s dim ambiance. Shadows fell against one another in uneven shapes, some reaching the carpet and giving it an even rattier appearance.

My heart pounded wildly against its ribcage, tears pooling in my eyes as I was led through the building. The vast chamber that followed was something of a crawlspace between the skyscrapers, a massive courtyard that was the cleanest, most polished area I’d seen in a long time—right down to the fountain, stone benches, and makeshift dais situated in the light of the single streaming column of moonlight that managed to penetrate the buildings.

My body trembled as my eyes processed the figure sitting atop the throne at its far end. Torn up banners and dust particles blew by in an invisible breeze, lightly fluttering the black fabric of the royal cloak that pooled around his legs.Two— _human?_ —sentinels stood on either side of the throne.

 _His_ throne.

The Tyrant.

I’d never felt fear the way I did at that moment.

The Tyrant’s eyes were covered by the hand that cradled his face, his large frame altogether leaning off to the side—unmoving, like a dark fixture in the courtyard. Black waves reached his shoulders, fluttering slightly in the same breeze that stuck my curls to the sides of my sweaty face.

My breath came out in shallow gasps, and hiding my terror was no longer at the forefront of my mind—I’m sure I wasn’t the only captive who fought in the hands of their bounty hunter.

 _“Stop, please—”_ I pleaded in a pitiful whisper, my knees meeting the hard ground as I was thrown before the dais. Every movement felt like an inch away from death as I slowly drew my eyes to the Tyrant.

Who had yet to move—or even give sign that he was breathing.

“Another prize,” the bounty hunter spoke in his thick accent, drawing the attention of the sentinels. _“Aaek laje,_ _Cerys Adelin.”_

I froze at the sound of my name, hot tears running down my cheeks as I lowered my gaze to the cracked ground. Even the cool breeze running through this place couldn’t stop the stress fever I was starting to develop.

In the corner of my eye, one of the sentinels turned his head toward me slowly, cold blue eyes set against stark-white skin. _“Cerys Adelin,”_ he said, turning his head toward the other sentinel. “The real one?”

“I tracked, after demolishing of West Point camp,” the hunter responded.

Silence.

“She’ll be too dangerous to keep.”

_Keep?_

More silence settled through the area like a physical weight. “Agreed.” The second sentinel seemed to glower. “We have enough, as of last week. You—finish this now.” 

_“My prize,”_ the hunter growled.

“You’ll paid in full by the end of the night.”

An approving grunt was the only response, and—

My heart leapt into my throat at the sound of a buzzing weapon turning on behind me, a hot tip touching the back of my neck. My head cocked up, eyes landing on the throne as words of mercy rose to the tip of my tongue. I could see now that the Tyrant’s eyes were closed, with the moonlight angled anew, casting shadows across his listless features. Brows set in a deep furrow, he wouldn’t look at me as I was executed—he didn’t care who I was.

I was almost tempted to cry out to him for help—if he didn’t care who I was, then maybe he could ‘not care’ enough to spare me.

“We take final words,” the first sentinel muttered. “If you have them.”

My kneecaps dug into the hard floors through my jeans, but the pain didn’t register as any pleading notions died on my tongue.

I hung my head forward, my mouth opening as I willed some words—any words—to rise. Anything to spite the situation I was in, the state of the world, the millions of people who died before me—

_Nothing…_

I was going to join my people. They’d spent their final hours fighting, and I’d spent mine running. Now the time was up, and I’d be seeing their faces soon in the afterlife.

I’d never believed in life after death until that moment—but I’d never believed in aliens, either. Who was to say I wouldn’t really be seeing my friends soon, welcomed by the song that that kept their memories alive until the very end?

 _“Are you, are you…”_ the first two words streamed out of my mouth in a tiny, quiet thread that only I could hear. _“Coming to the tree…”_

 _Silence._ Silence everywhere except my mind, where I heard their voices.

 _“They strung up a man, they say who murdered three…”_ I closed my eyes tight. _“Strange things did happen here—no stranger would it be, if we met at midnight in the hanging tree.”_

The gun’s power siphoned behind me in a high pitched noise, ready to strike, my heart pounding as I waited for darkness.

_“No.”_

My eyes burst open, the dulcet note of the voice sending a resounding shudder through the room. My shoulders, legs, and breath shook in the cold night air, movement barely registering as I lifted my head to the Tyrant, his hand draped over half his face.

Cruelty. Bitterness. Revilement.

Those were the things that emanated from the thin, narrow glare that sliced the air between us—through just the one eye that was visible between his fingers, as the other was kept hidden in the shadows of his hand.

“Your—majesty?” The first sentinel began uncertainly, looking down at the Tyrant. “We…have enough, we don’t need to keep this one. She’ll be more trouble than she’s worth.”

Lips slightly parted, there was no response from their leader. Only the cutting glare he kept fastened on me—utterly unreadable, save for the dark malice glinting in those emerald depths.

The sentinels exchanged glances, and then the first one spoke again, “What would you have us do?”

Again, no response.

For all that _they_ seemed uncomfortable, I practically disintegrated under the weight of the stare that pinned my existence to that very spot. I’d have scattered into a thousand pieces if I could, to escape it—blown away into the wind.

“Alright…” The second sentinel nodded to the hunter. “Just…take her where we keep the rest.”

My lip trembled, and I was all too familiar with the hands that clamped down on my shoulder next, the cold glare of the dark prince weighing on me as I was dragged away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm not sure what to say because I'm not sure anyone's going to be reading this (I've heard dystopian's a mood not everyone has a taste for), but thank you for reading if you're here. I recognize some of your names, and I couldn't begin to express how much the support means to me. It keeps me accountable, it keeps me writing--which means it keeps me practicing, and most importantly, it keeps the learning process fun. Whatever I accomplish (if anything) outside FF will rest on the shoulders of what I learn and experiment with here, and I have you to thank for that. 
> 
> As for the story--Loki is "Dark Prince" material here. I can't picture him being anything other than profoundly depressed after getting what he wants, nor can he build himself a second Asgard in a world he's destroyed. So, we'll see where this leads them... 'Til next time!


	3. Green-Eyed Sentinel

A thick fog settled around me, the silence deafening as I stared listlessly at the single lamplight looming across the street, the darkness of what was once Central Park looming like a menace behind it. Mist billowed from the lamplight outward, letting it stretch further across the street than it would have without it—almost reaching me on the other side.

The lamp had occasionally flickered throughout the several days they’d kept me tied up here, back facing the decrepit city. Bruises formed along my wrists and arms, marking where the Chitauri had tossed me back and forth between them days ago, trying to figure what to do—and then again and again, during the sparse moments I’d been removed from the pole and given just enough sustenance to keep me alive.

I guess they’d forgotten what to do with me since then.

I was cold. Starving. Wiling away at the base of the pole, barely worth a spare glance from the occasional sentinel that wandered by—both human and Chitauri alike. The metal was cold against the back of my head, my breaths growing weaker and weaker as I stared into the light. The occasional sounds of shuffling feet and rustling leaves had startled me in the beginning—I paid them no mind now. If something jumped out of the shadows and killed me then and there, it would have been a favor.

I’d taken to humming, letting the notes fall out of my lips one by one.

Lamplight fell on my face as I let them slip out, too tired to expend the energy on lyrics. Wind carried the sound of rustling from the bushes, but I didn’t look away from the ambient light—man or monster, I didn’t care what it was. So I let my eyes close, the faint tresses of sleep beginning to edge upon me with the melody.

Until a figure stepped out from the shadows.

Eyes lidded and heavy, I barely made out the movement at all before its silhouetted form stepped onto the street, a face coming into focus—my own.

My head rolled forward, silenced as my breaths quickened by infinitesimal degrees. The song died on my lips as fear wrapped around my chest like a weight, growing as the phantom of me drew near—and stalling my breath as she kneeled, barely making a sound at all.

"What…" I breathed out, looking up and down her. She was even wearing my clothes, except that they were cleaner, her face fuller and with a bit more color. "What's…what's happening—"

The phantom pressed a finger to her lips and then extended it to my own, stopping just shorted of them. A wicked, knowing smile pulled the corner of her mouth to the side, eyes gleaming with a sense of resolve I hadn't felt in years.

Just as my lips parted to respond, a third voice muttered in a commanding tone somewhere to my right, “Who are you talking to?”

I blinked, panic jolting through me with the bit of adrenaline that had managed to wake me. Tall and armored to the teeth, a lean frame emerged from the mist, striding toward me with an automatic gun to his chest. Green eyes glared down at me coldly, dark waves contrasting against pale skin, barely reaching the man’s ears.

“Who were you talking to,” he demanded again, a menacing fixture in the darkness.

A sentinel.

I looked back at the empty space in front of me, the phantom gone. Was she a hallucination? “Answer the question,” his voice came again, green eyes roving across the darkness I stared into.

The last of my energy was leaving me as I stared up at the sentinel, who merely stared back. I must’ve looked like it, too. Several long passes over the length of me had him striding to my side slowly, no doubt looking for signs that someone was tampering with my bindings.

Kneeling beside me, his expression was vastly emotionless as he observed the shackles around my wrists. I winced when he gave them a tug.

“This hurts,” his voice was smooth and soft—and his words sounded more like a statement than a question, though I nodded all the same.

I leaned forward a bit, then felt my boots shuffle as my body toppled over. One arm snapped across my chest, pushing me back up against the pole. Head cocked back, those green eyes observed my face keenly, donning a distant look as he drank in my features.

_Those eyes…_

They adorned what was decidedly a handsome face, trailing a cold hand as it appeared on my forehead.

“You’ve a fever,” he stated—again, more of a remark than a question.

Did I, though? My eyes were red, and they did feel a bit raw. I realized then that I struggled to take a single breath, though there was no congestion to speak of. When was the last time I’d eaten?

“I…” I minced out the word, his head tilting toward me curiously. “I…can’t…”

“You can’t what?”

I tried to shake my head, but I felt my consciousness leaving me, barely hanging by a thread. “I don’t feel…well…”

“You’re shivering.”

I’d been shivering for days.

A lengthy sigh, and then I felt the sentinel move behind me, anchoring me up by the shoulders as he tended to my shackles. Metal clacked against the sidewalk as they fell, and my arms felt like noodles as I drew them forward. Red rings had been rubbed into my wrists, painful to the touch.

They fell to my lap as the sentinel appeared again, turning his weapon onto his backside as he hoisted me up. Some semblance of alarm and protest rang through me in the back of my mind, but my head fell against the crook of his neck as I was lifted.

My eyes closed slowly, but I was halfway awake against the man’s shoulder, feeling the gentle sway of his walk—like I was nothing in his arms.

The characteristic ‘clicking’ of the Chitauri sounded all around us as he walked. After some indiscernible amount of time, the night sky made way for the cover of some crumbling skyscraper. And if I didn’t know any better, I’d have thought we’d stepped into an elevator moments later—the ensuing ‘ding’ amidst the darkness proving it so, as I was carried from the darkness of the enclosed space.

Pawing aimlessly at the man's chest, he muttered a low 'hush' before kicking some door open, striding down a crumbling hallway. I began to open my eyes, looking around as twinkling lights shone through the broken glass walls that spanned what had to have been an apartment.

I was set down onto my side, on top of something soft—a bed—while the entirety of New York laid before my slitted gaze in a panorama. Hands pulled back the sleeve of my jacket, checking my pulse and then returning a hand to my forehead.

“Stay here,” the smooth voice spoke again—like I was going anywhere.

My eyes had just begun to close when the sentinel reappeared again, startling me back from the edges of sleep. There were some clanging noises in a box, and then practiced hands lifted me up to begin removing my jacket, freeing the sweater underneath. A hand cradled the back of my neck as he lowered me back down, then pulled my sleeve up easily to my elbow.

I nearly flinched at the small prick I felt.

My head rolled toward the sight of a first aid box lying atop a pile of rubble, then at the careful administration of the syringe in my arm—kept under a steady watch by the sentinel hovering above me. The entirety of the city’s lights cast dim shadows across his features as he peered down at his work, eyes briefly rising to meet mine in the darkness.

There was no compassion in them—no kindness. My mouth moved, trying to form words, and his attention merely flickered down to my lips for a moment.

“Quiet,” he muttered, returning his attention to my arm. “You’re very ill. Go to sleep.”

“Who…” I tried anyway. “Are…” 

He looked up at me, the sound of clanging in the background drawing his attention over his shoulder.

A pair of Chitauri soldiers stalked into the room from the hallway, standing at attention. One of them spoke in a guttural language to the man. But he merely glanced down at me once before responding to them in kind, keeping his attention on me as he spoke.

Fear rolled through my limbs as I felt the Chitauris’ eyes on me, my free hand creeping across my chest until I felt his sleeve. The sentinel’s attention fell to where my fingers grappled onto the harsh material of his uniform, brows flinching a bit before returning to me.

_Why are you helping me?_

The question must've been in my eyes. He lowered his gaze to the syringe, removing it slowly as he spoke again, "Go to sleep."

I looked toward the Chitauri soldiers, my heart racing as they looked on at us. I felt a finger at my pulse once more, pressing sternly into my skin—drawing my attention back up to the green eyes glinting as they peered down at me. _"I said, sleep."_

My lashes merely fluttered a few times, eyes burning, before I could finally lower them all the way. Consciousness didn’t slip away immediately, and I heard and felt the steady exhale that fell upon my face. The Chitauri spoke again in their language, and they were answered by the man—who, by the sound of his voice, hadn’t shifted in proximity to me.

 _“Sleep…”_ his voice echoed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey, all! Sorry this chapter is, like, stupidly shorter than my chapters usually are. I actually wrote about 2000 extra words, but I started feeling really iffy about it when it was done. I'm going to take a few days to think about it, because this could go in one of two directions setting-wise, and I'll post when I decide.
> 
> Anywho, thanks to everyone giving this story a For now, I hope you guys liked this! I’ll leave you all with this thought: Loki’s world is a magical, mystical one on my mind. That’s what I’m going for in this story. I can’t really say much else (yet) without giving anything away, but I'm treading on new territory here and I'd really like to know how it goes for you guys! 
> 
> Anywho, thanks to everyone who’s given this a shot! To my reviewers and lurkers alike-happy fanfic-ing!


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